Siege in Sydney Cafe. Hostages have been taken.

[Borgholio]

My faith in humanity just rose sharply.

I wish we Americans could be as dignified as the Aussies are being right now.

[tim31]

Not all Aussies, but a lot of us are working hard to keep those that buy into the Murdoch press's interpretation of events on the actual facts.

[Flagg]

@rupertmurdoch 'AUST gets wake-call with Sydney terror. Only Daily Telegraph caught the bloody outcome at 2.00 am. Congrats.'

That fucking guy. Fuck him.

Vile fucker, isn't he?

Thanks a lot.
Anyway, why the fuck did they just storm in shooting? Was there some indication the dead asshole was going to start popping hostages, or was a certain politician making the calls?

[mr friendly guy]

@Flagg

The fucker fired first, then the police stormed the building.

From what I heard he had threaten to kill the hostages. At that point with nothing left to lose, the manager wrestled him for the gun at which point it went off leading to the death of two hostages.

[tim31]

I heard one angle that he was falling asleep and the manager made a play for the gun, with the practically and tragically inevitable result. But I wasn't there, and the people who were are either not talking for operational reasons or are going to need to spend time discussing it with professional counselors.

[Alkaloid]

Yeah, the manager going for the gun story seems to be the story most people are hearing. Either way the police went in because more people were going to get shot.

[Jub]

I wish we could take these guys around and parade them around as the losers that they are. It's better than letting the media run free with speculation about their motives.

[Crown]

If you've been keeping up with the story you might already be aware of the following; the Lindt shop was located directly opposite Channel 7's Sydney headquarters, and at the beginning of the siege the entire offices were emptied and taken over by the police as it provided an unparalleled view into the shop.

At some point, the police allowed one 7news cameraman and one 7news reporter back into the office, and the camera man provided the footage which the police command used to monitor the gunman's movement sitting along side a police sniper. Here is his interview with 7news, and the important point, according to the cameraman's interview the instance which triggered the police breach was a sound of gunfire and the confirmation from the sniper that a hostage was shot at 'window 2'.

Here's the video; 7news

[Crown]

Ghetto Edit :: Sorry that last part should read 'hostage down at window 2'.

[cmdrjones]

I'm surprised no one has posted this.

I'm not.... This has two pages of comments. 3 people dead. The college rape "overcorrection" has, what, 8?
and counting...

[Darmalus]

I'm surprised no one has posted this.

I'm not.... This has two pages of comments. 3 people dead. The college rape "overcorrection" has, what, 8?
and counting...

There's not a lot to discus from these one-time events, it happened, it was bad, it's over. If it wasn't for the side conversation about taxi fares this thread would be under a page long.

By contrast, the overcorrection thread has decades of gender politics, shifting values, demographic changes and strong and divided opinions. Much more fertile ground for conversation.

[cmdrjones]

I'm surprised no one has posted this.

I'm not.... This has two pages of comments. 3 people dead. The college rape "overcorrection" has, what, 8?
and counting...

There's not a lot to discus from these one-time events, it happened, it was bad, it's over. If it wasn't for the side conversation about taxi fares this thread would be under a page long.

By contrast, the overcorrection thread has decades of gender politics, shifting values, demographic changes and strong and divided opinions. Much more fertile ground for conversation.

It has the added bonus of being about sex too. I agree to a point, but when viewed within the wider context of "clash of civilizations" or "4th generation warfare" there is a LOT that can be teased out of this one as well. I'd be surprised if the "i'll ride with you" twitter phenomenon doesn't send this one spiraling off into space like Klingons plinking at voyager probes.

[mr friendly guy]

http://www.news.com.au/national/what-wa ... 7158546221

List of demands.

It seems like this nutjob wanted to
a) talk to our PM
b) claim Australia was under attack by IS (by getting us to supply him the IS flag).

I suspect being associated with IS would flatter Man Haron Monis, since he is someone who even Muslims in Australia as early as 2008 were disassociating themselves from him. Something about him doing things like claiming he was a Sheikh.